Sirius Black and the Drapery of Doom

He hated it, hated the concerned whispers behind his back, the looks of deepest pity, the pleas to please think of Harry and not do anything ... "reckless."

Sirius treated the empty kitchen to a bitter laugh.

How long did they imagine he'd've stayed here, shut up alone in this blasted house, if it hadn't been for Harry? He'd've been out there fighting whether bloody Dumbledore liked it or not. But he wasn't. He was perfectly capable of seeing that his godson needed him to be there, so there he stayed. He wasn't about to forget it either, and did not appreciate being beat over the head with anxious reminders all the time.

Sirius glowered at the fireplace for a while, forgetting the empty bottle in his hand until it slipped from his fingers and rolled down the table. He'd just started to wonder if draining it so fast had been the best idea, when he heard some creaking and shuffling coming from the direction of the boiler room.

"Master is alone," Kreacher announced. "Where have all his filthy friends gone, Kreacher wonders?" Sirius grit his teeth; his blood was starting to boil, but unfortunately his stomach was also starting to complain.

"Why they do not visit him anymore?" the elf continued to mutter as he crossed the kitchen slowly. "Have they grown tired of Master, nasty, useless drunk that he is?" Kreacher paused by the doorway, but didn't look back. "My poor Mistress. She always knew this one would turn out rotten. Oh, how she used to say to Kreacher --"

If Sirius had still been holding the bottle, he would've thrown it at the elf, hard. As it was, he could only manage a rancorous croak of, "shut it, Kreacher."

The elf started in mock surprise, turned, and bowed, leering malevolently all the while.

Sirius looked away. His eyelids had started to droop, and the sounds of Kreacher leaving the room sounded oddly distant to him. He wondered vaguely why, in so many millennia of magical history, no one had invented a good sobriety spell yet....

******

How much time passed, he couldn't say, but when the footsteps came overhead again, Sirius was ready for them. Tonks had said Kingsley was coming over. But when the door opened, it was Moony and not Kingsley who walked in. Tonks had not said Moony was coming over.

"You're not Kingsley," Sirius declared, pointing an accusatory finger in Lupin's general direction.

"Well spotted, Mr. Padfoot," said Moony in his Professor Moony voice. "Ten points to Gryffindor."

Placated by this, Sirius returned his head to the table. Remus walked over and sunk wearily into a chair opposite him.

Sirius had a nagging suspicion he was mad at Moony....

"Why'm I," he began, trying not to slur, "why'm I mad at you?"

"You're sozzled," Moony replied matter-of-factly.

"No'm not," he mumbled, though he knew it was a dirty lie. "Jus' cause I don' agree with you 'n Molly...."

"Molly isn't here, Sirius," said Lupin sensibly.

"Then why're you?"

"Must be the gracious hospitality. Oh, Tonks said to let you know she's left a message with -- er --" Moony hesitated.

Moony was hiding something. "With...?" Sirius said impatiently.

"Kingsley," Remus replied quickly. "He can't get away from work yet. They're having an internal hearing on the so called, 'McGonagall Incident.'" He sounded bitter for some reason. "Don't worry, Fudge will make the whole thing disappear before dinnertime, I'm sure."

"Good," said Sirius, feeling reassured.

Remus frowned, apparently not reassured. "Just how much have you had already?" he demanded.

"How much what?" Sirius asked, confused.

"This," said Remus, brandishing an empty bottle in Sirius's face. "How full was it when you came in here this morning?"

Sirius thought about it. "'Bout half, I guess."

Remus groaned and vanished the bottle. "Impressive, even for you," he said dryly.

A new nagging suspicion began to tickle the back of Sirius's brain. "Why're you mad at me?" he asked, slightly worried. He didn't want Moony to be mad at him.

"I'm not mad at you, Sirius...."

"You are," Sirius insisted, growing more alarmed by the moment. "You're tired of ... you -- you hate me...."

Moony was doing a very good job of looking bewildered. "Of course I don't hate you. Why would I hate you?"

Sirius struggled to focus on his friend and to remember what he'd done so he could apologize. He really wanted Moony to stop being cross with him; Moony was the only old friend he had left. Unfortunately, the room around him had slowly started to spin, which was most unhelpful. He only managed to babble a few words like "nasty" and "useless."

Remus shook his head. "You're raving," he said, rising purposefully from his seat.

Something clicked in Sirius's mind. "Full moon." Remus froze, halfway out of his chair, and stared at him. "You're mad I didn' wan' you to take the Wolfsbane."

The werewolf's expression went from puzzled to curious and he slowly sat back down. "Go on," he encouraged, as though Sirius had just said something very clever in class.

"You hate transforming without it," said Sirius dolefully. "An' you don' like going out on full moon anymore, but you did it for me an' I threw rats at you!"

Remus shook his head again, looking half amazed and half amused. "Remarkable."

"What?"

"How insightful you can be when you're pie-eyed." He smiled faintly and added, "Well, I'm glad you said that, but I wasn't mad at you -- not for long, anyway."

"Why not?"

"Know you too well."

Sirius considered this. "I know," he nodded sadly, "I'm horrible."

"Er -- not horrible, exactly -- more like difficult.... You've never been an easy friend to have, Padfoot, surely you know that?"

"Then why'd you -- why d'you put up with me?"

"Good question," said Remus, appearing to contemplate the matter. He seemed to be suppressing a laugh too, but Sirius didn't see anything funny about it.

"I don' deserve ... you're too good ... Moony," Sirius hiccupped and tried to cling to his train of thought. "Never deserved ... friends like ... too good ... you and Prongs ...."

"For Merlin's sake, Sirius," Remus sighed, standing up. "I don't know what's got into you this morning -- besides half a bottle of hard liquor, of course -- but you're talking nonsense again. And I just got back from a long mission, I am too tired to listen to you carrying on like this." He walked to the pantry, then looked back over his shoulder. "And if you say one word about my morning, I'll throttle you."